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State-run early childhood program expanding to all parishes by 2015

Day care centers respond to new unified system

Cayden Coleman tries to control the falling blocks while playing with friends at the Learn and Play Daycare Center in eastern New Orleans, Wednesday, July 17, 2013. Testing 3- and 4-year-olds is the newest front in Louisiana's school accountability campaign. (Photo by Ted Jackson, Nola.com | The Times-Picayune)

All publicly funded early childhood education programs in Louisiana must start testing students and undergo state evaluations by 2015, the Education Department said Thursday. The announcement comes as the state expands its pilot evaluations of day-care centers, Head Start classes and pre-kindergarten from voluntary status in 15 parishes to mandatory in 64 parishes, and unifies them under a single set of accountability rules.

The initiative arose from the realization that only half of Louisiana's children entering kindergarten were ready to learn at that level. In 2012, the Legislature's Act 3, pushed by Gov. Bobby Jindal, mandated a more rigid and universal set of standards for any publicly funded early childhood program.

That includes standardized testing for students, as well as a ranking system for early childhood centers based on test performance, much like the School Performance Scores for public elementary and secondary schools. The state however, has not yet decided how it will weigh student test results or how these will factor into a center's overall score.

"When only half of children enter kindergarten ready to learn, a new vision is required," Education Superintendent John White said. (Read the announcement.)

The testing does not involve toddlers darkening circles on a computer-read answer sheet, or even writing answers on paper. Instead, early childhood teachers evaluate 3- and 4-year-olds throughout the school year by observing their progress toward 38 developmental goals ranging from counting and learning the alphabet to "solves social problems" and "interacts with peers." Assessments are to be done every few months in an "authentic" setting, with children participating in activities that bring out qualities on which teachers rate them. Students will be graded on a scale of 0 to 9.

Participation in the pilot has been voluntary. In New Orleans, 27 out of 160 eligible child-care centers, including all federally funded Head Start programs and all centers run by public schools, are participating this year. Together they serve 4,450 children.

In St. Tammany, eight of 40 centers are participating. They serve about 2,000 children.

The state will be adding more parishes to pilot the program in March. It plans to continue adding more parishes every few months before achieving full participation by July 2015.